Author: artbychristinemallabandbrown

I'm an artist based at the Spode factory site in Stoke on Trent. I paint, draw and create digital art. Contact me at mallabandbrown@aol.com

Need more….

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My craft stall

I’m running out of minature paintings, I’ve sold a few and given some as presents. They are all different and I need to paint some more. What to paint? I’ve done anything from a Morris minor car to the planet Jupiter. I’ve also painted the moon, birds, flowers, hearts, patterns and giraffes in the sunset. Cats of course and stained glass windows.

They are more craft than fine art I think, but if someone wants a tiny painting, matchbox sized, they don’t need much space to display it! It can go on a shelf or a bookcase, or anywhere else. They are not expensive despite the time it takes to paint them. I just love sharing art.

Lesser Celandine

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One of the plants that appears in Spring, this is lesser Celandine. It has mid green shiny leaves and yellow and white daisy like flowers. This plant is one of the things that used to be on a website where people recorded when things appeared in the Spring, like butterflies, moths, flowers, tree blossom for example. It was a citizen science project. I don’t remember what it was called.

Lesser Celandine spreads by little bulbs (bulbils) that can stick to shoes or animals feet. It’s pretty, but if you get it in your garden it can spread like mad. I’m not sure if animals van eat it, it just looks cheery in Spring.

Wet!

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There is a saying ‘in like a lamb, out like a lion’ (and vice versa) when it comes to March weather. We also talk about March winds.

After a very dry February, March has turned wild. It started quietly, but as the month has progressed the rain and wind has blown in over the Atlantic, causing low pressure systems to scud over us with record levels of rain falling.

Last night the wind was howling, one of the cats ran in, his coat glistening with rain. He looked like an otter that was just out of a river! He slept under the cover of my chair, like it was a little cave to keep warm in. He knows when to stay warm despite seemingly loving the awful weather.

One word?

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What is one word that describes you?

How to choose? I have a few in mind, but I guess the main contender is Creative. That’s because of all the art I create and things like this blog. I love experimenting with images and working on them in different ways, I am quite eclectic, I might never have used a technique before, but I will go through different stages and steps to come up with a fresh idea. My mind thinks about all sorts of things all the time so it could also be the word Chaotic, but I have discounted that because I do plan things sometimes. I am not totally disorganised.

Hot

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Today’s #bandofsketchers prompt was hot. I drew flames and then use photodirector to add texture and pattern. I liked imagining the different colours in flames. I think this has a watercolour feeling to it. The app gives it a more even look, as without it the felt pens I have used look a bit rough because the tips of them are wearing out and getting broken and the ink is drying up.

Full on day!

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I started out today at the Factory Floor at Spode singing with our choir and another choir. We were with the Boat Band who played cajun music first. Two of the band are our choir leaders. We sang before lunch was served and then again afterwards. It was great fun.

Then I went home for a rest, but I decided I felt well enough to go to yoga class. I haven’t Bern for a couple of weeks. I do chair yoga because I can’t get down on the floor and I can’t do inverted postures. My blood pressure is too high for that. Even so I felt tired afterwards, but it made me realise I have got over the cough and chest infection I’ve had for a few weeks.

Straight after yoga I sang with the other choir I am in. Each song was fun. I felt my voice getting clearer and I was able to hold notes I hadn’t been able to last week. We are learning some new songs and I was pleased that I could hear the tunes and pick them up. I had a really good day. I hope it carries on like this. X

Need to take better photos…

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Three pottery paintings I did a few years ago. The one of the jug is going to a new home soon. ❤️

I took them to a joint performance of our Clay chorus and the Starfish choir because we were singing a song about the Willow pattern (this is based on a Spode platter) and also a ship called Hispaniola bringing pottery clay from across the seas that had been written for us by Mark Whitter. I was very proud to have my work appreciated.

I am making cards from these if I can so I need better photos to show them clearly .

Was that YOU singing?

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What was the best compliment you’ve received?

Years ago, I was in my twenties, my friend and I were staying somewhere on a residential course. She was a musician and there was a piano in lounge of the house we were staying in. I asked if I could try singing something (it was before I had singing lessons).

I’d just finished singing ‘Over the Rainbow’ and a man came in. He looked at us both and said to my friend ‘you have a lovely voice’ . To which she replied that it was me that had been singing! Then the man said something like ‘was that YOU singing?’ I think he was surprised because I wasn’t pretty and I had big glasses and probably didn’t look like a singer (what do they look like?). He said ‘you were very good’ again and left! I take that as a big compliment even if it was a bit strange…

Buds on the willow tree

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Ooo the fuzzy buds are opening on the old willow tree in the garden. Once they fully open the blue tits will start pulling at them, I don’t know if they get the fluff out of them to use in their nests or if they are eating insects on them?

I’m not sure what type of willow tree it is, I think it’s a wild type, one that floats in on a seed and grows, a bit like a buddlea Bush, we have them too. They sneak in, but the butterflies love them. Which reminds me, I need to prune the buddleas, you have to cut them back by two thirds before they start growing in the spring, so that’s a job to do. Spring is on the way! Gardening begins.

The Owl and the Pussycat

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Went to sea, in a beautiful pea green boat…

They took some money and plenty of honey, wrapped up in a five pound note….

A nonsense poem by Edward Lear, who also wrote the Dong with the luminous nose and the Yonghie Bonghie Bo. There used to be a TV show in the seventies that included these characters, but the animation was very weird and too colourful if that’s possible with the poems set to odd music, and I’m afraid it actually put me off reading them!

I also get Edward Lear and Lewis Carroll ( who wrote Alice in Wonderland etc) mixed up.

I realised this morning that I have the iconic animals sitting on my bookcase in the bedroom. They are a tiny cat made by an artist friend and an owl  I made of clay pressed into a mold. I hadn’t put two and two together before. I guess that anything can spark a chain of memories, there’s a phrase for it in semiotics, about signs and signifiers, but I’m afraid I’ve forgotten it!